he National League Central race still has 10 weeks to go. But the Pirates have already beaten out the Cardinals on one count: Joakim Soria.

Swinging their second deal of the day to solidify the bullpen, the Bucs on Thursday acquired the fading Tigers’ closer—who had been also on the wish-list of the Cardinals, looking to bolster their own bullpen even after last week’s acquisition of Steve Cishek from the Marlins.

There’s no way to dress this up: That Dustin Ackley’s career as a Mariner ended with him being traded for one fringe 4th OF and a relief pitcher with a horrendous walk rate and iffy health history is a real shame.

The St. Louis Cardinals found themselves in a pickle in 2000. Looking for young arms to add to the organization, St. Louis struck up a deal with the Montreal Expos to send Britt Reames and another player to Montreal for two pitchers. They just had to decide who to send: Fernando Tatis or Albert Pujols. Obviously, the Cards sent Tatis and the next season Pujols won NL Rookie of the Year before ...

In 1999, I played for the Detroit Tigers. We weren’t a good team and I was a left-handed reliever, the most dispensable job in baseball. In late July, the rumors were flying. I had a player I knew well from an opposing team come up to me during batting practice one day and say, “Yankees, huh? That would be nice.”

Word had gotten around that there was a possibility of a deal that would send me to the New York Yankees. I am a New York native and ...

Here is a story that appeared in the Sports and Sportsmen section of the Lowell Sun on Dec. 27, 1900, just when the legendary new York Giants pitcher Amos Rusie was deciding whether or not to accept the trade to Cincinnati. It is filled with all the misogyny and absurdity of the time:

No current version of WAR accounts for framing, a catcher’s art of carefully receiving the pitch in such a way as to cause the umpire to call it a strike. That happens to be Posey’s most important defensive talent. Good framers turn pitches outside of the zone into strikes and keep pitches within the zone from being called incorrectly as balls. This ability, in turn, scares opposing batters into swinging at less-optimal pitches, making the impact of good ...

“I am going to communicate with the Brooklyn owner and tell him unless we get better umpiring and better breaks on the decisions, I’m going to quit,” Lee Magee, manager of the Brooklyn Federal league team, declared [in Kansas City] yesterday.
...
“I’m not going to put up with the sort of stuff we have been going through most of the season…I was put out of the first game of the season and I have been the butt of every umpire’s anger since that time.”

According to sources, the Indians and Cardinals are believed to be making progress on a deal that appears to be significant, likely involving top Cardinals’ prospect Rob Kaminsky. The sides have been discussing Brandon Moss in recent talks as well, according to a source. The possibility of a one-for-one-swap of Moss-for-Kaminsky appears to be in play.

Capitalizing on their history of success and baseball’s skyrocketing value as real-time TV, the Cardinals have reached a deal with Fox Sports Midwest that will guarantee the team more than $1 billion and assert for years to come their televised presence in a broad, devoted region.

The team and its exclusive local broadcast partner are expected to announce a new, 15-year agreement Thursday morning, officials on both sides confirmed. The new deal will begin with ...

JULY 30: The Dodgers will indeed pay the final two installments of Olivera’s signing bonus, tweets David O’Brien of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. That means the Braves are essentially taking on Olivera on a six-year, $32.5MM contract that began this season. He’s earning $2MM in 2015, of which about $754K remains, so their total financial commitment to him will be about $31.25MM over the course of five and a half years.

Ultimately, the Phillies got two highly regarded but flawed position player prospects, a high-probability starting pitching prospect who has a chance to be a solid No. 3, and a pair of depth arms. That’s a good mixture of quantity and quality for Hamels, exactly what they should have tried to get in this franchise-altering opportunity.

Was this haul really worth waiting for? Don’t get me wrong but, although they got a lot of bodies, I’m not sure they got the really high-upside guy they were holding out for. Williams has been pretty good in Double A but he’s just OK. Alfaro, despite his placement on prospect lists, looks overrated to me. Thompson is the best pitcher of the lot and he grades out as a middle of the rotation guy, at best. Time will tell, of course.

Brewers manager Craig Counsell informed Gomez of a deal that—pending medical approval—would have sent him to New York in exchange for starting pitcher Zack Wheeler and infielder Wilmer Flores, who teared up upon learning of the trade during the Mets’ 7-3 loss to the Padres. Several hours later, Mets general manager Sandy Alderson broke the news that “there is no trade.”

A source confirmed early Thursday morning that the Mets nixed the deal due to concern over Gomez’s right hip. The ...

While many fans are aware that baseball is generally exempt from antitrust law, fewer realize that courts have adopted widely divergent views regarding the extent to which MLB’s operations are actually shielded from the law. For instance, just because MLB is generally immune from antitrust law does not mean that a court would necessarily give the league free reign to engage in anti-competitive practices in areas completely unrelated to professional baseball (such as if, for example, MLB ...

“On the bright Sunday afternoon of March 18, 1984, Randy Johnson took the mound for the University of Southern California at Arizona State University’s Packard Stadium.

He was among the most interesting collection of sports figures ever assembled on a college baseball field.

The game featured two players who would break the major leagues’ single-season home run record (one still holds it). One would become an NFL linebacker and head coach, another would eventually be a major-league manager. ...

“There’s a lot of baseball left, and there’s no point in looking at the standings because they don’t mean anything right now,” manager Bruce Bochy said. “The game goes on through September, and there’s a lot of work to do. We’ve been through this.”

When do they start passing around stacks of money to Rhode Island’s elected officials? Historically it’s the most effective way to screw over taxpayers, especially in that state.

The Pawtucket Red Sox have invited business, government, media and real-estate developers to travel with managing partner Larry Lucchino to Durham, North Carolina, on Aug. 5, to meet elected and business leaders there, including the owner of the Durham Bulls Triple-A baseball team, and to attend a Durham Bulls game.

Two fights with the umpire marked [yesterday’s Federal League] double-header between Brooklyn and Kansas City…

In the first contest Umpire Corcoran called two Brooklyn runners safe on what [Kansas City] contended was a perfect double play. The argument which followed was punctuated with fisticuffs by George Stovall, manager of the locals, and he was sent to the club house. In the second game Lee Magee, manager of the Brooklyn team, objected to a decision ...

Storen reacts like expected. Storen and Papelbon have one thing other thing in common, neither of them are team first players.

Storen didn’t sound like a guy who was happy about the change.

“All I’m going to say is, I’m aware of the move and I’ve talked to Mike about it. I’ve talked to my agent about it,” Storen said. “We’ve had some ongoing discussions. Until those have progressed, I’m just going to leave it at that. No comment for now. But as the situation goes, I’ll keep you guys posted.”

“I felt like I got blindsided a bit. I thought I was in the loop, in the conversation,” Tulowitzki said in his first comments since the deal went down. “So it definitely caught me by surprise. I was shocked and it caught me off guard. I think maybe I was a little naive to think I would be so connected to the (trade) process.”